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Topic: A few Unsolved Mysteries (Read 3011 times)

I was wondering why one would not place honey coated equipment and cap scrapings where the bees can get to it and recycle the honey instead of washing it down the sink. Surely they would clean it up really good.

Is the opening where bees go in and out only three eighths of an inch? Is that enough?

Can some one post, or is there already posted, pictures showing the uncapping procedure? Unsure of how to uncap without digging out larg chuncks of comb.

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:rainbowflower: Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak. :rainbowflower:

As to your first question, some people do let the bees clean the frames and equipment and they do an excellent job. But you run a very big risk of creating a robbing frenzy. Other bees will stumble upon this buffet, not only the bees from that hive, and when the frames and equipment are clean and dry, the foreign bees will go looking in the nearby hive for more honey!

Second question: Three eights of an inch is typically called "bee space". This is the amount of space inside the hive that bees will leave for themselves to move around in. This is the reason for the need for such exacting measurments when you build your equipment. If you leave any more than three eights of an inch, the bees will fill the space with burr comb, any less and they will block it up with propolis.

Third question: If you use an uncapping knife ( this is a heated knife which when used at the proper temperature slices through wax comb like... well like a hot knife through butter ) you should not have a problem with gouging out large chunks. Look on the www.dadant.com site and they should have pictures of this knife in use.

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By the rude bridge that arched the floodTheir flag to Aprils breeze unfurledHere once the embattled farmers stoodAnd fired the shot heard round the world-Emerson

Couldnt you just put the combs back in that still have a bit of honey in them, they could clean it up and re use it without other bees knowing about it. This would only work if you used the wired combs for honey production and not honey/comb production. Any thoughts? bye

I have put my wet, empty supers about 100 yards from the hives and the bees will clean everything out "clean as a whistle" in a day or so. I have mixed feelings about doing this as it does create a frenzy and many bees die in fray and it can spread disease. I've heard if you put wet empty supers over a strong hive's inner cover they will clean everything and pull the honey down and store it. Hopefully this year I can try this method instead.

I had see the knifes but just wondered how deep you start cutting and with knifes you heat then cut, how fast does the knife cool down.

The three eighths was for entrance and exit from hive, I already read about inside diameters. But when I place the stuff I built together is when I noticed the opening was only three eighths and wellllllll it looks small.

I was talking about all the honey coated equipment after say extracting honey. I thought about promoting robbing possibly but wondered about placing far from hive. But then you couldn't be sure your bees get it. But what difference would that make if it was going down the drain anyway. I never thought of a feeding frinzy like sharks do, and didn't think bees would get injured over it.

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:rainbowflower: Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak. :rainbowflower:

Also Jerrymac, there is some experience involved in cutting the caps. I remember when I was uncapping, years ago, that I would gouge the combs here and there. But after a little practice, the caps came off smoothly and easily!

Lots of people I know whizz (and I mean at hgh speed) a blow torch over the caps - the wax melts - and no need for an uncapping knife at all. Much faster in terms of processing large amounts of frames, and also you don't loose any honey to the "uncapping tray". You have ot be sure not to heat the honey underneath by always keeping the blowtorch on the move.